not building pauper institutions in this mountain country to be
forever a dead weight for the Northern churches to carry, but
institutions which will very speedily take care of themselves, and
give to others as they have received.

This is a portion of the South where slavery scarcely existed. When
war came, it was loyal to the Union almost to a man. This fact shows
that they have a natural affiliation with "Northern ideas." The caste
spirit is among them--as it is indeed in the North to some extent--but
it much more readily yields to reason and loving teaching than in
other portions of the South. Vigorous and extensive missionary work
can and will mould the ideas and sentiments of this whole region, and
thus establish no-caste churches and schools, where they would
demonstrate to the South that they do not carry with them social
disorder and every baleful influence.

Amid the success, joy and hopefulness of the year's work, came the
affliction of the shooting of Prof. George Lawrence, while about his
duties in our school in Jellico, Tenn. It was the work of a miserable
creature whose brain was fired with whiskey, and who was urged on by
the saloon element as a retaliation for earnest temperance work. After
long and anxious weeks of intense suffering, a brave fight against
death proved successful, and we now hope that our missionary's life is
spared for many years of usefulness. Nearly a hundred men have been
shot already in this one place, and the place itself is not more than
six years old. Is it strange that these mountain people who have a
glimpse of better things, are appealing to us every week of the year
to plant institutions among them? Is it not the voice of Christ
clearly commanding us to possess and subdue this land, and to
transform it into a part of his peaceful and beneficent Kingdom, which
shall join hands with us to pass on the torch of Christ to others yet
in darkness?

THE INDIANS.

The people of America are determined to press the Indian problem to a
speedy solution. Provision has been made for giving lands in
severalty, and the next great movement should be to induce the
Government to provide secular education, and the churches to furnish
religious instruction to all the Indians. The American Missionary
Association, during the year, has responded to this new impulse by
enlarging its work--in the opening of new stations, in the erection of
new buildings, and in the appointment of more missionar